Lambs to the GMO Slaughter

Dallas, TX – -(Ammoland.com)- American diets are being bombarded with genetically modified foods.

Big seed companies initiate it. Big government enables it. Big food business loves it. But Americans are the ones paying the price through their pocketbook and especially their health. And worst of all, as the old song goes, it may be “killing you softly.”

For those who may be unaware, genetically modified plants are grown from genetically modified or engineered seeds, which are created to resist insecticides and herbicides so that crops can be grown to withstand a weed-killing pesticide or integrate a bacterial toxin that can ward off pests.

As I pointed out in my C-Force health & fitness syndicated column this week on the same issue, genetically modified foods have been sliding into our diets since 1995, when the EPA analyzed genetically engineered corn.

Today, in the United States, as much as 80 percent of packaged foods contain ingredients that have been genetically modified, according to the Grocery Manufacturers Association. And 90 percent of many U.S. crops are grown with genetically engineered seed. In Iowa, for example, 91 percent of the corn and 93 percent of the soybean acres were genetically modified last year.

But unlike 60 other countries around the world — including the European Union, which has required that genetically engineered foods be labeled since 1997, most Americans will never know if they are consuming GMOs because there are no federal and few state laws that require GMOs to be listed among food ingredients.

And where does our government stand on all this GMO business and proliferation?

The Chicago Tribune reported that the Food and Drug Administration has permitted the sale and planting of genetically modified foods for 15 years and that the Obama administration has approved an “unprecedented number of genetically modified crops,” such as ethanol corn, alfalfa and sugar beets. The Alliance for Natural Health added that the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture now wants to eliminate any regulatory controls from genetically altered corn and cotton.

Strangely, instead of overstepping their boundaries as they do with virtually everything, the Obama administration retreats from any type of enforcement or regulation forcing food companies to list GMOs among their foods’ ingredients.

Can you say aiding and abetting the enemy?

Leading the pro-GMO march is Monsanto, the world’s largest seed maker and a publicly traded American multinational agricultural biotechnology corporation. The colossal seed giant is moving full-steam ahead to become the No. 1 U.S. and global farm supplier. They are so monopolizing the seed industry that Forbes recently cited a Fortune article noting that Monsanto “expects to earn about $5.1B in the current fiscal year and double its earnings per share within the next 5 years.” The article concluded by calling Monsanto: an “unstoppable Leviathan” and saying that “GMOs are here to stay.”

Public demand for transparency when it comes to GMOs is becoming louder, yet government approval advancing their use moves ever so quietly forward. For example, missed by media and little corporate fanfare, the USDA weeks ago gave its stamp of approval of a second-generation GMO soybean plant designed to resist a toxic herbicide called isoxaflutole, an agent that has been labeled by the Environmental Protection Agency as “a probable carcinogen.”

Bill Freese, science policy analyst at the Center for Food Safety has been tracking the introduction of these second-generation GMO crops. Says Freese: “Biotech companies are now poised to introduce a host of ‘next generation’ GE crops resistant to more toxic herbicides as a false ‘solution’ to massive weed resistance. But their effects will be to generate still more intractable weeds resistant to multiple herbicides.”

Almost all genetically engineered foods have been engineered for one purpose: to tolerate higher levels of herbicides. The problem is, weeds are constantly becoming more tolerant to the weed killer, creating a vicious cycle resulting in higher usage of more and more toxic herbicides such as Dow’ AgriSciences’ 2,4-D, a component of Agent Orange. This requires more modifications to genetically modified foods.

As I’ve pointed out on this issue before, instead of eradicating the need for insecticides and herbicides, genetically modified plants will warrant stronger and more intense pesticides in order to outwit and overcome superbugs and greater strains of diseases.

And who’s to say what GMOs will do — now or in generations –– inside our bodies as we consume them on a greater scale and they become a part of the bacteria in our digestive tracts?

With more and more U.S. foods being grown, manufactured and imported from places such as South America and Eastern Europe — the precise areas outside the U.S. where Monsanto’s biotech seeds are gaining their greatest foothold, food imports are quickly becoming a recipe for disaster. Remember, too, much of the GM crop grown around the world is used for livestock feed, so there’s more than one way for GMOs to be ingested in your diet, such as from meat and dairy products.

According to GMO food proponent Dr. Pamela Ronald from UC Davis, “Genetically engineered crops currently on the market are as safe to eat and safe for the environment as organic or conventional foods.”

But is that the case?

The Alliance for Natural Health cited the late George Wald, a Nobel Laureate in Medicine and Physiology and one of the first scientists to speak out about the dangers of genetically engineered foods: “Recombinant DNA technology faces our society with problems unprecedented, not only in the history of science, but of life on the Earth. … Now whole new proteins will be transposed overnight into wholly new associations, with consequences no one can foretell, either for the host organism or their neighbors. … For going ahead in this direction may not only be unwise but dangerous. Potentially, it could breed new animal and plant diseases, new sources of cancer, novel epidemics.”

Equally alarming is a recent study that was published in the journal Neurology. According to Medical Daily, a review of 104 studies conducted around the world revealed that exposure to pesticides, insecticides, weed killers, fungicides, solvents, etc., increased the risk of developing Parkinson’s disease by 30 to 80 percent.

If there’s a bright light on the GMO horizon, it’s going to happen because we consumers put the pressure on the food industries and cry out to individual food companies.

As a result of consumer advocacy, Whole Foods plans to require labeling in all products sold in U.S. and Canadian stores by 2018. And General Mills plans to stop using bioengineered cornstarch and sugar cane for its original Cheerios and to prominently display the fact.

Who’s next? That’s up to you and me.

About: Action hero and Second Amendment activist, Chuck Norris is one of the most enduringly popular actors in the world. He has starred in more than 20 major motion pictures. His television series “Walker, Texas Ranger,” which completed its run in April 2001 after eight full seasons, is the most successful Saturday night series on CBS since “Gunsmoke.”In 2006, he added the title of columnist to his illustrious list of credits with the launch of his popular Internet column. Now Chuck is a regular contributor to AmmoLand, click the following link to See more of Chuck Norris on AmmoLand Shooting Sports News.

11 thoughts on “Lambs to the GMO Slaughter”

Way to go Chuck. Americans need to know this information. Unfortunately, many conservatives are in the pocket of these corporations. Mike Pompeo the phony conservative who preaches states rights has introduced a bill into the House to prevent states from enacting GMO labeling. What say you Chuck?

“Many conservatives are in the pockets of these corporations”…When big money is at play…You’ll find everyone wanting a piece of the action be it Republicans or Democrats…Conservatives or liberals…They tend to all flock together when opportunities to make money present’s itself in the various fields of investment and or the stock market.

We are at a major disadvantage in having our voices heard as long as our politicians (BOTH Republican and Democrat) are willing to be bought. Monsanto has infiltrated our government with form employees/lawyers being appointed to the Deputy Director of the FDA, 2 on USDA, 2 on EPA, Ag Negotiator, and of course a supreme court justice (Thomas – former Monsanto lawyer). Clinton (8 appointments), Bush (2) & Obama (5) have appointed a number of government employees. Politicians cave to companies like Monsanto, who spend as much money as the tobacco companies did in their glory days. Unfortunately, I see it getting worse before it gets better.

Hear that a lot and it’s not true. No matter how many millions of years you want to wait, you’ll never find a fish and a tomato eventually “hybridizing” together. Doesn’t happen. That’s the difference.

Hybridization is much different than genetic modification, you idiot. Monsanto isn’t cross-breeding pea plants together like Gregor Mendel, they are splicing the DNA directly – and not to make the plant look different. They are making the plant resistant to these carcinogenic chemicals – which the plant holds in its cells, is harvested, and ingested by humans. Might as well just guzzle some Round-Up, you fool. Now that I mention it, how ’bout you do that, and spare us your ignorant drivel.

Hackety man your response to Big Bill is a perfect illustration of the lack of scientific understanding in general and of DNA in particular that leads people to fall for this nonsense.

All living organisms contain the exact same 4 building blocks that make up DNA. The arrangement and sequence is what separates different organisms from each other. Errors happen in the replication of that code all the time. That variation is what allows selective breeding for a trait or traits and hybridization to work. Those two processes simply require time, repitition and a certain amount good fortune to produce an organism with the desired traits. As often as not, unwanted traits are created and propagated in the process. Genetic engineering is a targeted approach to the same outcome with a smaller chance of creating and propagaing unwanted traits.

This article is a perfect example of how an imaginary threat is created and spread to instill fear and coerce people into asking for more government involvement and control. That is always the real point of this type of fearmongering. Without fail, people like Chuck, that should know better fall for it and help promote the fear. Ultimately they end up asking for more government involvement, just as intended. Conservatives, having paid attention to liberals for any amount of time, should know that the issue is never the issue, the issue is always, always control.

With a little observation one quickly comes to realize that the proposed solution to all of the supposed “Big Evils”, Big Oil, Big Business, Big Pharma, and in this case Big Ag, is always more and bigger government. None of the other “Bigs” have near the capacity for harm and destruction that big government does.

Read labels for everything you buy. The more unrecognizable ingredients are surely harmful. Nitrites, nitrates citric acid, sulphites, msg and on & on are all poisons. Monsanto has people in the government which is why you won’t know what is in your food. When you don’t eat it, eventually the beast will die.

[!] http://naturalsociety.com/5-things-gmo-corn-shouldnt/ Here are 5 things in GMO corn that shouldn’t be in anything we put into our bodies: 1. E. Coli Bacteria DNA Using recombinant DNA technology, biotech has infused our corn with a strain of E. coli. Most E. coli strains are harmless, but some, such as serotype O157:H7, can cause serious food poisoning in humans, and are occasionally responsible for product recalls.

The harmless strains are part of the normal flora of the gut. They can benefit their hosts by producing vitamin K2 and by preventing the establishment of pathogenic bacteria within the intestine. But the GMO E. coli bacteria has been known to cause virulent factors in many animals and humans. Mutated forms of the bacteria, which are known to occur often in recombinant DNA, can then infect a person or animal’s gut, causing digestive issues and more… 4. Up to 6 Varieties of Bt Toxins (Cry Toxins)

GMO Corn grown in the U.S. and elsewhere is full of Bt toxins. Bacillus thuringiensis is a Gram-positive, soil-dwelling bacterium commonly used as a biological pesticide. (They are also known as Cry and Cyt toxins.) These toxins have been proven to be toxic to mammalian blood by Dr. Mezzomo and his team from the Department of Genetics and Morphology at the Institute of Biological Sciences, University of Brasilia.

These scientists were already aware that Bt toxins were extremely dangerous and potentially deadly at levels above 270 milligrams per kiligram (essentially ppm), but they went further to test levels ranging from 27mg/kg, 136mg/kg, and 270mg/kg for one to seven days. They found that even at the lowest level of exposure, Cry toxins were hematoxic…